“Against Soga, yes.”
“What have you got?”
Eyes boring into mine, the old man leaned forward. “I can open doors.”
“Okay. Who are they?”
“They are what you’ve seen.”
“Where are they based?”
“Maybe Soga-jujo, but most likely elsewhere.”
“How many are we talking about?”
“The size of their organization is unclear.”
“You give all-too-familiar answers.”
“You’re asking the wrong questions. Names and locale we don’t have, but useful information we do.”
“Can you give me an example of their handiwork?”
“Sanford Smith-Caldwell, the Boston businessman eight months ago.”
“Really?”
As the CEO-elect of a major East Coast financial firm with global interests, Smith-Caldwell’s death had been paraded across world headlines.
“Believe me, it’s true. Before him, a Bonn broker in Hong Kong slated to return home to the company presidency. Australian businessman Howard Donner, whose family sold his clothing empire to a large Asian conglomerate within days of his death. Also likely, but not yet confirmed, a French developer who had just purchased a large block of neglected seafront property in Italy.”
“I heard about the Frenchman. The radio said he fell overboard from his yacht and drowned. Also something about a high number of summer fatalities among late-night swimmers in that part of the Mediterranean.”
The powerbroker gave me his open-maw grin. “Soga would play to the statistics.”
“Were all of the deaths ‘accidental’?”
“Yes. The Frenchmen drowned, Smith-Caldwell fell down a flight of steps at his vacation home, the German’s BMW collided with a semi, and Howard Donner’s private jet crashed in the outback.”
“No suggestion of . . . other hands?”
“Not to the investigating authorities.”
A frown signaled my displeasure. Maybe his claims were valid, or just maybe he was tossing around prominent headlines for me to soak up. Since he offered no verification, he could pitch whatever he wanted my way and I had no chance of substantiating his claims. The only thing I knew for certain was that the nameless man before me was one of Japan’s shrewdest political minds—and one of the most dangerous.
I said, “Japantown wasn’t subtle.”
“They tailor assignments to the client’s needs, but I assure you an act as blatantly brutal as Japantown is as rare as a flawless black pearl.” Noting my skepticism, he said, “Not unexpectedly, you are a hard man to convince. You want something for nothing, but diving for pearls comes not without risk.”
I stiffened. Was he threatening me? Desiring nothing more than to be finished with the old manipulator, I spat out a challenge. “Bowl me over, then.”
A low growl escaped his lips. “You may regret those words.”
I sunk back in my chair, wondering what I’d unleashed.
“Four years ago,” he began in a low rumble, “there was a string of murders in Los Angeles, Salt Lake City, and Chicago . . .”
Four years ago . . . Los Angeles . .
He knew something about Mieko.
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spiteful gleam in the old powerbroker’s eyes told me he would extract payback for my verbal scrappiness, as players in his circle invariably do.
“Soga is usually extremely subtle. That is how they’ve stayed in business for so long. Four years ago they spread a series of killings over half a year. No American law enforcement agency ever connected the crimes. Not the local authorities, the FBI, the U.S. Marshals. No one caught the common link. Since we unofficially monitor all unnatural deaths of Japanese nationals, we pieced it together.”
My breath caught in my throat. This wasn’t going to be another list of headlines.
“Seven people died. Four in Los Angeles, two in Chicago, one in Utah. In each case, at least one victim was wealthy and owned car dealerships in prime locations. Of the three primary victims, two were Japanese nationals.”
No wonder I never turned up a motive. The target was not Mieko’s parents but her uncle. Through a Japanese cousin in the trade ministry, her uncle had locked up pivotal Nissan franchises early in the game, building a successful string of outlets on the West Coast from San Diego to Seattle. After his death, his heirs sold the business to the first bidder and retired young.
I said, “So Soga camouflaged the automotive connection by killing the uncle away from his home. Are you sure about the dealerships?”
“There can be no doubt. The lots of all three owners were swept up
by two shell corporations based in the Balkans and sold to a third in Costa Rica.”
Sickened, I sprang from my chair, needing to stretch my legs, needing to think. My abrupt movement triggered a reaction from the bodyguards, and they charged in at a fast clip. At the last second, the old man shook them off.
“Let’s avoid sudden movements in the future, shall we, Mr. Brodie?” said my withered host.
Pacing back and forth in front of the oversize table, I ignored the comment, instead wrestling with the new puzzle pieces he’d provided, while, with undisguised glee, he watched me squirm on the pin he’d thrust into me. I ignored that, too.
At his death, Mieko’s uncle possessed an annual pretax income of three to four million dollars a year. An orchestrated grab of the three businesses from the bereaved at a hefty discount that offered instant financial independence without the next-of-kin having to lift a finger would be a win-win, allowing someone to build an empire on the cheap.
The old man asked derisively, “Have I swayed you this time?”
My breathing was ragged, and my chest heaved. Had I lost my wife to some hustler’s ambitions for steel on wheels? Was Jenny growing up motherless because of blind greed?
My response was terse. “Did you follow up on the shell companies?”
He shrugged bony shoulders expressively. “My people tried but failed. Nothing but dead ends. That is where you come in. You and your organization.”
I collapsed back into my chair. From deep within the corridors of Japanese power, I’d been gifted with a credible nugget of information about the Japantown killers no one else could possibly uncover. And with it, I’d also been given a believable motive for my wife’s death. Knowing I could backtrack his story, the powerbroker couldn’t stray too far from the truth. But when all was said and done, as with his earlier examples, he offered no hard evidence.
I needed more. Much more.
At once heartened and frustrated, I ran my fingers through my hair.
“Exactly what kind of service does Soga provide? Clearly, they can’t go around killing people at will.”
“Anything in Japan can be explained if you trace it back to its roots. In the first two and a half centuries of their existence, Soga was involved in spying, strong-arming, blackmail, and kidnapping, as well as the not-infrequent assassination. They worked first for the ruling shoguns and daimyos, then for the new Meiji government, and finally for our budding war machine as Japan sought overseas territories before and during World War Two. After the collapse of the war effort in 1945, Soga expanded overseas, and judging by their assignments slowly acquired clientele in Asia, Europe, and the Americas.”
“Why go abroad?”
“After Japan’s surrender, work here was scarce. The Allied Forces occupied the country for more than five years, so Soga went searching for additional income sources and found a demand for their services in the private sector abroad. First with some of the high-powered Japanese who escaped from Manchuria and other places and then with foreigners.”
“Which part of their service?
The old man gazed up at the unlit chandelier. “The same types of machinations, with an emphasis on sophisticated, high-level ‘accidents’ of a permanent nature. For equally high-level fees.”
I stared at the powerbroker. “Can you prove this?”
“Of course not.”
I shook my head. “Let me rephrase that. How do you know?”
“Research. They don’t kill tatami makers, Brodie-san. Victims are prominent citizens of their prospective countries, often globally active.”
“Go on.”
“After years of probing, I now know to look for the Three Ps—property, promotion, power. If one or more of these change hands with the death of a major principal, the incident becomes a candidate for further research. Soga’s fee starts at half a million dollars American, and escalates according to degree of difficulty and what they see as the resultant benefits to their client. Soga offers a premier service at premium prices. For that, it delivers a clean job. No hitches. No loose ends. An error-free rollout of their plan. Viewed against assured future earnings for the client, the price is cheap. Through the tax filings of the Japanese
car dealers’ next-of-kin, my people determined that by offering quick cash on the heels of the tragedy, the buyer—Soga’s client—picked up the businesses at two-thirds of their market value, a savings of nine-point-seven million dollars on those two deals alone.”
“You’re telling me they sell death to grease business deals?”
“To ‘smooth over’ a buyout or merger, yes. Or to secure a promotion. Or protect their client’s already lucrative position. Soga eliminates obstacles or threats when a carefully planned accident makes economic sense. Some would argue that such an idea is a logical extension of your American-style free market.”
The man was insane. “You may not be in the best position to pass judgment on such practices,” I said, knowing that his dirty tricks were probably just as devastating.
My nameless host’s eyes flashed, giving me the first physical sign of how dangerous he could be should he choose to flex his muscles. But then he rattled me with the candor of his next comment:
“That’s all the more reason I understand them.”
Suddenly, I felt soiled and depressed. Repulsed. But you couldn’t hunt in the swamp without slogging through the muck.
“So who hires them?” I asked.
“Businesspeople who share the same worldview. Soga is only doing what they have always done. To be frank, from the days of the shogun, there has always been undesirable work that needed doing. Today, the thriving capitalist system—whether in the U.S., Europe, Asia, or the Middle East—is simply another power base, and it too has undesirable work that needs handling. Soga has always filled that need. Sound familiar?”
“Disgustingly so. Why haven’t you . . . ?”
“Availed myself of their services? Not from lack of trying, I assure you. My competitors found Soga first. And if there is one thing Soga upholds, it’s loyalty to their client base. That and their guarantee to tidy up annoying loose ends.”
That stopped me. “Are you saying Brodie Security’s become a loose end?”
Frosty eyes regarded me. “At the very least. Despite your rudeness, I’m going to give you some advice, Mr. Brodie. Advice that could save
your life. Continue on as you have been but be discreet in your movements. Discretion in the extreme is required if you desire to survive this ordeal. Any other regimen will bring Soga down on you like a sledgehammer.”
I closed my eyes and inhaled deeply. That horse had already left the barn. “Too late. We’ve been to the village.”
My host’s eyes widened in astonishment, maybe for the first time in years. “
What?
Did they approach you?”
“They did more than that.”
I gave him a short version of our visit. By the time I finished, his distaste for my presence had reshaped itself into unbridled admiration. Then he wagged his head in despair. “Such a waste. You had so much promise. I thought that this time I would have a shot at Soga.”
“Maybe you will.”
“I wish it were true, believe me. But it’s not possible now. Had I known of your trip to the village beforehand, I would never have initiated contact. There’s no point doing business with a dead man.”
“We’re not out of the game yet.”
“On the contrary, you’re in far too deeply. By now, if they don’t know everything about you, they will in short order. If there’s one mystery here, it’s why you’re still walking around.”
The cold certainty of his analysis curdled my blood. At the instant I opened my mouth to reply, I saw the bodyguard at the front door slump to the floor.
Was the powerbroker a psychic as well?
I leapt from my seat and, finding no cover in the room, instinctively crouched behind my armchair before the unconscious watchdog’s body had settled, waiting to see how the attack would unfold, hoping to shield myself from any gunfire. The next moment, unseen hands pulled the guard at the rear entrance into the darkened doorway behind him and we heard a muffled grunt as he too collapsed to the ground.
But still no sign of the assailants.
Just silence.
Swiftly scanning the dark chamber only confirmed what I already knew: I was cornered in a large room with no weapon and no cover worth a damn.
Adrenaline electrified me, and my body tensed. In seconds, I’d be facing them. I clenched my fists, set my shoulders, and readied myself. Then I rose from behind the overstuffed scarlet chair. Any bullets would soon penetrate its soft cushioning. Better to face them head-on and take my chances.
Looking frailer than ever, the old man’s glance swung nervously from his fallen servant to me while we waited—unarmed and unprotected—for men in black to charge into the room.
CHAPTER 44
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was not my time to die.
Noda eased into the room with a snub-nosed Smith & Wesson leveled at the old man’s chest but his vigilant eyes focused on me. “You all right?”
“Am now.”
With a grunt, Noda scanned the room. “Need some light in here.”
He flicked on a switch by the doorway and the overhead chandelier sprang to life, spraying soft white beams into every corner of the room.
“Scenic,” the laconic detective said, gazing at the powerbroker with unvarnished curiosity.
Our host was completely hairless. Face, arms, and pate were bare. Incredibly, his eyebrows had also vanished with the rest of his body hair. His facial skin was dry and yellow-gray and had caved into eyesockets and cheeks like a farmer’s field into a cluster of sinkholes. Revolted, I looked away.